Previous Day (Church, Palace & Temple in Hanoi)
Destination: Hanoi, Vietnam
Duration: 4 Days 4 Night (Aug 29~Sep
02, 2018)
Day 2: Let your Love be like the
Misty Rains, Coming Softly, but Flooding the River
Serenity Villa Hotel served
breakfast at ground floor with a small spread with choices of a main course per
pax. The main course consisted of various egg dishes as well as local cuisine
such as Pho Bo. We’d booked a day tour from klook.com to Halong Bay thus we
were eating and waiting at the same time. I was a bit worried as the operator
did not contact me to confirm the pickup but thankfully the tour guide showed
up on time. Since Serenity Villa Hotel was located at the end of a small alley,
we had to walk to the main road to board the bus in the rainy weather.
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| Breakfast at Serenity Villa Hotel - My Favourite? - Mini Baguette! |
The tour guide explained there would
be only 9 people on this tour due to low season. He joked that this would be
like a private tour as normally a cruise in high season would be full with 45
people. The bus ride from took about 4 hours with a halfway 20minutes stop. I’m
glad to say the ‘pit stop’ restroom was cleaner than expected (better than
Malaysia’s N-S Highway’s restroom) in case anyone is interested. =P
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| Driving Pass the Mosaic Wall in the Rain |
We finally arrived at the port with
intermittent rainy weather. Our tour guide went to buy tickets and left us to
utilize the restroom at the port which was again very clean with toilet papers
provided – no doubt a great effort from Vietnamese Tourism Board for the
tourist. We were ushered into the port swiftly by our guide to embark our
cruise for the day.
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| Finally Arrived at Port |
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| Water Puppet Show |
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| Our Cruise of the Day |
Lunch was served hot on the cruise
immediately and off we sail off to the wild! The lunch was nothing exceptional
but that might be due to me losing appetite over a sick stomach due to the
super spicy chili sauce from dinner last night. *facepalm* Note to self – never
eat something too spicy during travel. Well, at least the restroom on the
cruise was clean and nice as well! Gosh! I think I mentioned restrooms 3 times
in 3 paragraphs! *too much info?*
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| Note the Halong Beer & Bia Hoi! |
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| Lunch! |
There was an upper deck on the
cruise for better photo-shooting and the weather was cloudy with occasional
misty rain. We loved the weather as we preferred the cold weather than
scorching hot sun. The tour guide continued to point out interesting trivia of
the area such as the limestones which was identical to the VND200K note.
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| Cruise Stopping for some Fuel |
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| Sammy having sunbath at the deck... |
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| Here is the Scenery in the 200K Note! |
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| Enjoying the Cooling Weather |
We finally made a stop for bamboo
boat ride or kayak per itinerary. All of us chose bamboo boat thus off we went
with our boat lady serenating us with song amid the limestones and caves. Some of
the caves had water dripping due to the rain earlier. The boat ride lasted
around 20 minutes and we were ushered back to our cruise again.
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| Stopping for our Bamboo Boat Ride |
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| Photo Taken by our Boat Lady |
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| Sammy is feeling Adventurous! |
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| Rowing into the Cave.... |
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| See the Boat Behind us with Umbrella? That's to avoid water dripping... |
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| The Kayak is in the wrong way? |
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| Time to go back... |
After cruising across the misty waters, we made another stop
at Thien Cung cave (Heaven Palace Grotto). In order to get into the cave, one
must climbed up some stairs (what else?). Rain water was also dripping inside
the cave nurturing the formation of stalactite & stalagmite thus the stairs
were quite slippery. The scenery from the top of the cave was breathtaking
though.
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| It's the Misty Rain.... |
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| The Kissing Chickens... |
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| Yawn... |
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| Oh we are here for the Cave! |
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| Let's take a Pic after the staircase! |
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| Oh Wait! Why are there more Stairs?! |
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| Finally inside the Cave!!! |
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| But more Stairs again? Hmm... |
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| Pretty huh? |
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| Help! |
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| What Else? More Stairs!!! |
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| Goodbye! |
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| A View from the Top... |
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| Stairs! Going down this time.. |
Thien Cung cave marked the end of our Halong Bay Day Trip
and we began our long journey to Hanoi again. Our tour guide gave us some tips
on famous food in Old Quarter thus we requested the bus to drop us at the
center of Old Quarter instead of our hotel.
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| Food Suggestion by our Tour Guide |
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| Goodbye Halong Bay |
Our 1st stop was Giang Café – a highly
recommended traditional café for egg coffee. We ordered egg coffee and egg matcha.
In order to have a perfect blend, one must stirred very hard to mix the ‘egg’
& the coffee – else the top layer would be too sweet whereas bottom layer
too bitter.
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| The Famous Giang Cafe on top of a Small Alley |
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| Menu? |
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| Sitting in the traditional stool style |
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| Egg Matcha!!! |
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| Egg Coffee & Egg Matcha |
We wanted to try the recommended crab noodle soup but
unfortunately the shop was closed. We ended up at Bami Bread for their Hoi An
Special Sandwich & roasted chicken sandwich – too bad the banh mi was not
as good the one in An Café.
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| Bami Bread |
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| Our Banh Mi - Hoi An Special & Roasted Chicken (with bones!!!) |
We continued our walk back to hotel and stumbled upon Pho 10
so we’d decided to give it a try. The soup was indeed flavorful but the price
was quite expensive at VND60K per bowl. The place was swarmed by tourists
though. Their menu consisted of various beef cut and cook but only well done
beef was available when we walked in. thankfully the beef was still tender even
though it’s well done. With an overly full stomach, we bid Hanoi goodnight and
finally went back our hotel.
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| Enjoying the Cold Breeze |
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| This is so TRUE!!!! |
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| Pho 10 |
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| Pho with Flavorful Soup & Tender Beef!!! |
Note: One thing we noticed during our walk in Old Quarter –
trip to Halong Bay was cheaper if booked on the spot especially for 2D1N stay. I
researched it online before the trip and most were at least RM550+/pax thus we
decided against staying overnight in Halong Bay due to the expensive price.
However, I saw price as low as USD65/pax (around RM260) for 2D1N in those
endless tourist centers.
Next Day (A Day in Trang An)
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